Droid Engineer Archive

Let us color our droids.

This would boost sales tremendously. At Master, I can color the adv R4 chassis in about 500 combinations of colors. It's awesome! I spend my time online just making these things and varying the colors then decorating my shop with them.

As for experimentation working, we first need more modules/functionality to experiment on, as other posters have suggested.

I think we need 2 things to make droids somewhat plausible with the Star Wars universe, and then a couple of other ideas:

1) The color needs to be implemented. I think this is very important.

2) We need Droid Specialization. The Medical Droids should be the ONLY droids which allow medical modules. Repair Droids and Treadwells should be the ONLY droids which can repair other droids. The lower level droids, like the mouse droid, should have limited functionality, (perhaps only allow Level 2 storage and data modules). The R2s should be the ones with crafting stations. They should be able to function in, and repair, speeders and spacecraft. There should be no 'uber' droid with crafting stations, storage modules, repair modules, and medical modules. The Protocol droids should have something to do, that they alone can do, too.

3) I bought a book called, "Star Wars: The Essential Guild to Droids". In it, they have dozens of droids, including harvester droids, scout droids,surveyor droids, and miner droids.Try implementing some of these, as well as combat droids.

Specialization will make a market for droids, and keep their functionality somewhat plausible with the Star Wars Universe.

Don't suppose we can actually get the class fixed and then go to another "issue"? Didn't think so...

Experimentation is broken, and coloring droids is broken, we could use a fix on that.

Experimentation is my Number One concern, followed closely by having the improvements we make in the subcomponents be reflected in the final product.

Following those two issues I would like to see Customizationworking. And then address the minor issues of certain droids not working with certain modules.

I gotta disagree with droid experimentation being the top priority.

I'd say the TOP priority is to make it so that lower level DE's can make something USEFUL. The problem with all the artisan classes except for architect is that people don't want anything made by a lower level crafter. Architects can sell medium harvesters and small houses still... but a DE might be able to sell an R5 with a crafting station, but it's unlikely if they have to compete with a master DE. Instead they must grind grind grind until they get ADVANCED probots and then buy a schematic for armor.

The real problem is how to solve this issue. It's not really acceptable to have higher level DE's lose the ability to make lower level droids. This is a tough problem.

One possibility is to have faction perks give schematics for droids that aren't in the normal DE line, but which require lots of low level DE parts to assemble. Then a lower level DE can make a single advanced droid. I don't really like this solution, though.

Another possibility is to make it so that more parts are required from DE's to help other classes, and vice versa. I would like to see more things like "droid compartments" and "power cores" for other classes. I would like to have to buy a blaster barrel from a lowbie weaponsmith to make a probot. I would like to sell a manipulator arm set for someone to make a weapon factory, and 5 from a factory crate for someone to make any other kind of factory. I'd like to have to buy a reinforced fiber panel from a tailor to make level 3 and 4 droid armor plates, and factory-made bio controllers for a surgical bot.

None of these components should require high experimentation to be effective so that low-level folks can make them. It'd add some annoyance, but ultimately, I think that making LOW LEVEL stuff required from other classes is the way to bolster them all.

Anyone have any other ideas of how to fix the player-run economy so that mediocre crafters had SOME market for something?

Important fixes for the short-term (caffeine):
1. A combat droid equivalent at least to a CL15. Pre-nerf probots, anyone?

Important fixes for the long-term (red meat), in order of priority:

1. Droid classes and specializations. This is the most key thing overall. Put droids
   in classes and restricting what modules they can use. Make is so that for almost
   everything a player can do, there is a droid that can do it too.


• harvest resources / maintain harvesters / survey. Luke trained C3P0 & R2D2 to work a water vapor moisturizer (or he was going to).


• transporting goods (BL Lifter?). Good way to deliver things to customers instead of running 20 minutes just to buy a level 2 med module.


• find people. Make a cert, fairly low level, so that anyone can use such a droid.


• slicer (R2D2 anyone?)


• repair / crafting


• combat (I'd like to see Droideka, especially, as well as assassin droids, droid soldiers, etc.)


• training / xp droids (like the little floaty-laser-shooter sphere that luke practiced on with a lightsaber. A sparring droid.)




2. Gradual decay of droids. They should require repair by either a DE or a DE-made tool of some kind (which itself would have to be replenished, like a stimpack). If such repairs are not completed, the droid dies (permadeath). The decay could, of course, be accelerated by such things as being in combat (combat droids would be tougher), how often they were used in their particular function, etc.


3. Experimentation. This is also pretty key, although this is not as important as the other two, as I see it. Master DEs should get like 15 experimenting points like Master Artisans do, and have a high rate of success. A full grid of at least 8-bit (preferably 16-bit) color should be available, as well as shades and maybe some simple patterns. Maybe image designers could create custom patterns. Experimentation should also be meaningful. An advanced probot with 20% effectiveness should have a 100-pt attack, where a probot with 75% effectiveness should have a 350-pt attack. Likewise, 20% quality should mean a 1000-hp HAM, and 75% should mean a 3500-hp HAM. Same goes for medical droids, item storage, etc, etc, etc.


4. Perhaps a farther-off thing to add at some point: programmability. It would be nice to have a simple scripting language and be able to program droids to do things and be somewhat intelligent. E.G.: if (attacking animal strength == 2*my own strength) then (kite attacking animal). Maybe this would also include the ability to tell a droid to move a certain distance in a particular direction, or move to a particular coordinate.
   
   

Implementing these changes would take care of almost all other problems/complaints. If droids were more function oriented (see #1 in long-term), newbie DEs would have useful things to make, like droid repair widgets and such, as well as lower-level droids that perform a specific task. I for one would like to see an MSE droid that makes toast :-). Actually, the MSE might be a good droid to use for extending the range at which you can command droids. A little radio on wheels, sort of. Specialized droids along with decay and permadeath would instantly be a foundation for a self-sustaining droid market, which is the main complaint, as far as I can tell.

Give it up, its not going to happen. Save your breath. Say what you like, however, your playing a fools game. Its a shame, but if you feel better, then by all means, continue...

Experimentation is the next big issue. Once they have a look at how worthless it is they will have to change things to make experimentation worthwhile.

My 2c.

My vote goes to droid customization. It would be cool to have a variety of droid colors and at least give us something to work with.

Experimentation comes in next.

Having protocol droid and such actually work would be a good step though.

BEFORE we get Experimentation working, we need customisation working!

With Customisation working properly we will have a larger variant of droids we can sell in that we can give physical differences to the same model.

I also think that, right now, getting the existing models we have functioning properly is MORE important than adding new combat models.

I've compiled a list of things that should be done (in order of importance):

1. Droid Customisation
   We need the ability to modify colours of existing droids, as well as being able to colour new ones. I like the idea of this being done in the same style as an image designer with the colour fading over time. It not only gives us a customer return but also means we don't have to carry around multiple droids of the same type with different colours...


2. Fix Experimentation
   So that we can create a range of good-and-bad droids of each model


3. Set the amount of droids that a Droid Engineer can carry
   These numbers should really mimmick the Creature Handler. For instance, a non-DE can only carry 3 droids in the datapad. A Novice DE can carry 5, Droid Production I can carry 6, Droid Production II can carry 7, Droid Production III can carry 8, Droid Production IV can carry 9 and Master DE can carry 10


4. Limit Modules to different droid types
   By limiting what module can be used in each droid type you are better defining the use of the droid as well as giving the Droid Engineer a better market to sell. For instance, Medical Modules should *only* be used on Medical droids (I.E. the surgical droid). Crafting Modules should *ONLY* be used on the R series Astromechs. Data and Storage could be used on most models. This gives the DE a selling point for droid types.


5. Give existing "useless" droids a use
   The prime example being the Load Lifter. We have all come up with many suggestions for this droid. However, given the current condition with the Creature Handler pet limit, I think *THE* best solution is to create a new "creature cage" module that can only be used in the Load Lifter. The Creature Cage could store 5 pet (or droid) control devices or something.


6. Create a new "weapon" slot
   Combat droids, both existing and new models, should have a slot for a weapon much in the same way that there is an armour slot. This can be filled by a special "Droid Weapon Module" which would determine the combat abilities of the droid. This means it would be possible to use a DZ70 frame that is equally as powerful (it terms of hit damage) as a probe. This means NO combat droid is ever useless. For instance, the difference between the DZ70 and the probe would now be the amount of armour that can be placed in the droid.


7. Remove the "Droid Customisation" line
   The four "droid customsation" skill boxes are pretty useless ... even when Droid Customisation is in-place, the only reason for gaining these is the increased ability to use colours. Move the "droid customsation" modifiers into the "droid production" line and replace the "Droid Customsation" line with "Droid Weapon Systems". The four skill boxes would now give the following:
   ¬Simple Weapon Systems - allows DE to build a melee weapon module
   ¬ General Weapon Systems - allows DE to build pistol weapon module
   ¬ Advanced Weapon Systems - allows DE to build carbine weapon module
   ¬ Complex Weapon Systems - allows DE to build rifle weapon module
   Each module would reflect the range and damage of a standard weapon of it's type (i.e. a CDEF).

These, I think, are 7 of the most important issues that need addressing right now.

The entire Droid skill tree is so broken it is like trying to repaire a vital machine that had been blown apart with a gernade. Where do you start? The droid experimentation has to be fixed, but it is not on my priority list. It is so like SOE to work on a low level skill first before addressing a major issue.

If the SOE dev team worked for a bomb squad, within hours there would be none left, because they would check to see if the battery was charge before disarming the warhead. The Devs really don't have a clue do they?

All I can do is pray for devine intervention and pray that someday soon, this will all be fixed.

Goss

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Sintrosi wrote:

Although I would imagine it will be awhile before I am asked for the next issue of concern I thought I would start this thread to try and beat them to the punch. Argue and post amongst yourselves.

I believe the next issue is Experimentation being broken, as well as only getting 5 experimentation points at Master. Thoughts? Ideas? Concerns?

Take your time, I imagine we have a month or so

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I think there are really two experimentation problems

1) lack of experimentation points.

2) experimentation has no affect on most of the droid modules anyway.

If we had more experimentation points, but the modules still behaved the same regardless of quality, it would be a pointless fix.

If modules were fixed so that the modules were affected by their quality, but we didn't get more experimentation points, then all of our droid would suddenly get much worse.

So I think both problems need to be addressed at the same time.

Also, if we get the probot unnerfing that we want,the devswill have to consider its new HAMs when deciding by how much experimentation can boost a droids HAM. Otherwise master DEs may be crafting 5000 HAM probots and the devs will just nerf the probot again.

We really need to a working repair kit to heal white bar damage on droids.